


miseritus stulti (pitying the fool)

by FatespinnersStaff



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Class Issues, Gen, Minor Character Death, Neighbors, POV Outsider, Spinner's End
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-07
Updated: 2016-06-07
Packaged: 2018-07-12 22:57:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7126804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FatespinnersStaff/pseuds/FatespinnersStaff
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Severus Snape is away, who is left to care about Eileen Prince Snape?</p>
            </blockquote>





	miseritus stulti (pitying the fool)

So many years after the closing of the textile mill, those left in Cokeworth were largely an uncharitable folk, not because they were of bad character, but because their guardedness often protected them from the unpleasantness of life. Left behind as they were, the people of Cokeworth knew that _any_ more unpleasantness was certainly more than enough. As such, these people of criss-crossing grey streets and identical grungy brick homes never took much interest in pitiable persons like the sour-faced and bitter-tongued Eileen Prince Snape.

Yes, Madame Snape had the misfortune to live in this town where unpleasantness was never lacking and so she languished at the dead-end of Spinner's Lane with little regard or remark by her neighbours. And how would anyone remark about her? The woman had no known friends nor relatives and any neighbours who might have at one time recalled her name had boarded up and left Cokeworth some years ago. 

This is why it was unsurprising to all around when, at the end of Madame Snape's life, those who were left to make her final arrangements were few and far between. 

Even as no one seemingly remembered the name of Eileen Snape, two women were aware of her in a round-about way. In the last years of Mdm Snape's life, after the miserable death of her miserable husband Tobias Snape - who, incidentally, a few neighbours _did_ recall (remembered as a particularly violent drunk frequently kicked out from the local pubs, but remembered nonetheless) - Madame Snape filled her empty and companion-free hours with the heckling of her nearest neighbours. When Mdm Snape was in a particularly adventurous mood, she would take a walk down to the street-fronts of those same pubs her late husband had frequented and mutter somewhat incoherently at the local lads and old men loitering about. Mdm Snape did not find herself adventurous fairly often, however, and so her heckling was primarily from her stoop or, on some colder days, the street-facing window between her dusty letter box and her paint-chipped front door. 

Madame Snape's nearest neighbours were the sisters Phyllis and Francis Dehr who had no sitting room to speak of and as such would drag two rickety chairs out to their kerb where, as nobody was inclined to take a stroll down the dead-end street with the lacklustre view, the sisters would find themselves the main targets of Madame Snape's heckling. From this unpleasant relationship, the Dehr sisters knew that the last lot of Spinner's Lane was occupied and not abandoned despite its ramshackle yard of scraggly vines and other assorted weeds. 

Madame Snape had been bullying the sisters Dehr for years when, on an unusually warm day Autumn day for the Mid-lands, the Dehr sisters took tea out on their mismatched chairs besides their kerb and found themselves surprisingly unencumbered for first time in quite some time. 

"That nasty old hag doesn't seem to be about today," Francis noted with mild interest while she nibbled a digestive.

Phyllis lightly returned, "You think she's taken a nasty turn? Might serve her right, I might say if I were so unkind, for all the good she does, that one." 

Phyllis and Francis were unconcerned when this absence continued for the next fortnight. "We've shamed her off, we have," insisted Francis. "And if we have not, then she's gone off to harass someone else, and well, that cannot be our problem to solve; we're not her keeper after all, yes?" Francis added and her sister readily agreed and that's how the exchange continued for some time. And so, it wasn't until a cold day of Christmas time that the sisters Dehr, having remarked once more that it had been quite awhile since the Heckler of Spinner's End had badgered them from her window or her stoop, braved the weeds of Madame Snape's yard.

“Perhaps I shall stay and you can run up, Phyllis,” Francis said as she eyed the yard of the End. “These weeds will start my hay-fever despite the season and I'll be none too pleasant to bear come Yule, and that would be I shame don't you think?” 

Phyllis would have none of it. “No, no, you can't be leaving me alone! The weeds won't bother your little nose if we make it quick so stop whinging and come along fast now or I will complain non-stop, I swear it, Fran!” She grabbed hold of her sister's arm and together they stormed their way onto the stoop of Spinner's End and - a slung rock at the front window later - the sisters Dehr, stumbled upon the weeks old corpse of Madame Snape, and furthermore found themselves burdened with the unpleasant task of laying to rest Eileen Snape despite themselves, for even to the people of Cokeworth, leaving her body to rot in her home of Spinner's End was too uncharitable a thought.

“At the very least,” muttered Francis as they stomped their way back home to ring the authorities, “you can't deny this old girl's stench _has_ bothered my nose!”


End file.
